Between the Poles

Nanosatellite and microsatellite market forecast to reach $2 billion by 2019

According to a recent article in Science, 132 CubeSats were launched in 2014.  The original 1U CubeSat, designed in 1999, was a 10 cm cube weighing less than a kilogram.  They could be launched on Russian rockets for about $30,000.  NASA has a program called the CubeSat Launch Initiative (CSLI) which provides opportunities for nanosatellites to fly inexpensively as auxiliary payloads on rockets supporting major missions. Currently they can be launched for about $100,000. The economics of these small satellites is so compelling that there is talk of a constellation of CubeSats replacing Landsat 8, which was launched in 2013 at a cost of $855 million. CubeSats are not restricted to low Earth orbit.  It is planned to launch 6U CubeSats into orbits around Mars next year.  The more generic terms for these satellites is nanosatellites for satellites weighing less than a kilogram and microsatellites for satellites up to 100 kg.

Planet Labs

The company was formed in 2010 under a different name.  In April 2013 Planet Labs launched two demonstration satellites, “Dove 1” and “Dove 2”.  Planet Labs has launched Flock 1 comprised of 28  CubeSats for Earth observation at an altitude of 400 km.  The satellites are intended to provide frequent snapshots of the planet at a resolution of about 5 m, allowing users to track changes such as traffic jams, deforestation, construction progress in close to real time.  The primary applications right now are agriculture - monitoring crop productivity, environmental compliance - monitoring restoration after mining, and commercial mapping - identifying new developments that require mapping. 

Skybox/Google

Skybox Imaging, acquired by Google, has launched the SkySat-1 and SkySat-2 satellites (each larger than nanosatellites at about 100 kg) which capture sub-meter imagery and HD-video of any spot on earth, multiple times per day to provide timely high-resolution imagery, HD video, and analytics.  First imagery can be seen here.

Spire Global

In November 2013 two nanosatellites, NanoSatisfi's ArduSat 1 and ArduSat X, supported by Kickstarter crowdfunding were placed in orbit from the International Space Station .  NanoSatisfi has since been renamed.  Spire Global Inc, has launched 4 out of more than 50 planned remote sensing cubesats into orbit at altitudes of 500–600 km. Spire's remote sensing satellites range from cubesat 1U to 3U and are built with Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) components wherever possible to lower costs.

Market Forecast

MarketsandMarkets has released a report entitled Nanosatellite and Microsatellite Market [Geographic Information system, Payload, Space Science, Satellite Communication, Satellite Imagery, Remote Sensing, Scientific Research, Reconnaissance, Satellite Launch] - Worldwide Market Forecast (2014 - 2019) in which it attempts to quantify the nano and microsatellite market.  Nano and microsatellites includes satellites that weigh about 100 kg (such as the Skybox satellites) and less.  According to MarketsandMarkets commercial as well as private ventures have started investing to capitalize on the opportunities presented through low-cost small satellite missions related to communication, earth-observation, remote-sensing, and many others. Integration of commercial-off-the-shelf electronic circuits is accelerating the demand for small satellites.  MarketsandMarkets forecasts that the market for nanosatellites and microsatellites will grow at a rate (CAGR) of 21.8% per year from $700 million in 2014 to $1.9 billion in 2019.

INSPIRE-Geospatial World Forum 2015 program released

INSPIRE-Geospatial World Forum 2015, a joint conference organized by the European Commission and Geospatial Media and Communications, has made available its full conference program. Almost 500 presentations are scheduled on topics including building information modelling (BIM), open data, big data analytics, open standards, linked data, cloud computing, crowdsourcing, Earth observation, indoor positioning, land information systems for smart cities, urban resilience and sustainability, health, agriculture and others.  Some 2000 delegates are expected to attend from more than 80 countries.  Top sponsors include Trimble, Topcon, ESRI, Digital Globe, Oracle and Bentley.

The theme of the conference is CONVERGENCE: Policies + Practices + Processes via PPP with a focus on improving coordination among policy-makers, technology providers and users.  Including geospatial data and technology in construction, agriculture, health and other industry workflows is an enabler for more successful public–private partnerships (PPP) by facilitating more informed decision making among the stakeholders.

Latest survey suggests rapid adoption of new geospatial technology in Asia/Pacific

Geospatial World has just published the results of a survey of 650 of its readers conducted between November 2014 and January 2015 targeted on their geospatial technology usage. 

Geospatial technologies

The geospatial technologies respondents were asked to report on their usage of are comprehensive; GIS, GNSS (better known as GPS in North America), satellite remote sensing, aerial photography, 3D Data, total stations, laser scanning/LiDAR, BIM, indoor positioning, UAVs/UAS, and ground penetrating radar (GPR).  Some of these have been widely used for years and represent mature markets such as GIS, GNSS, satellite remote sensing, aerial photography, and total stations.  Some are relatively new and are still being deployed in new market sectors such as laser scanning/LiDAR and 3D data. Others are new innovations and are just beginning to get some market penetration such as BIM, indoor positioning, UAVs/UAS and ground penetrating radar (GPR).

More rapid adoption of newer geospatial technology in Asia/Pacific

One of the things that I found interesting is that more often than not Asia/Pacific ranks highest or tied for highest in frequently using many of the newer technologies, for example, 3D Data (~40%), GPR (~12%), and BIM (~20%).  Asia/Pacific's leading adoption of newer technologies is even more noticeable when considering total usage (frequent+occasional); 3D data (~90%), LiDAR (~75%), BIM (~75%), indoor positioning (~65%), UAVs/UAS (~55%), and GPR (~22%).  This suggests that the adoption of new geospatial technology may be more rapid in Asia/Pacific.  This is perhaps due to Asia/Pacific first of all being very aware of and eager to adopt new technology and secondly being less saddled with legacy business processes tied to older technology which is a major problem in the developed economies of North America and Europe.

Airbus constellation of Earth observation satellites adds SPOT7

Last June Airbus Defence and Space's SPOT 7 Earth-observation satellite was launched successfully from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in India. The first images from SPOT7 were released three days after the launch,

Today SPOT 7 was commercially launched, making its high-resolution imagery available to all users. SPOT 7 joins Airbus's constellation of SPOT 6, Pléiades 1A & 1B, TerraSAR-X and TanDEM-X Earth observation satellites.  SPOT 6 and SPOT 7 cover wide areas with a resolution of 1.5m.   Pléiades 1A and 1B offers 50 cm resolution. TerraSAR-X and TanDEM-X can dependably acquire 25 to 40 cm resolution as well as wide-area radar images independent of weather conditions.

With SPOT7 the acquisition capacity of the Airbus constellation has reached six million square kilometres per day. SPOT 6 and SPOT 7 are phased 180° on the same orbit as the Pléiades constellation, thus combining wide-area collection with the ability to image and revisit point targets the same day.  The Airbus constellation makes it possible to view every day, every point on the globe in both high-resolution (1.5 m) by a SPOT satellite and in very high-resolution (50 cm) by a Pléiades satellite.

Earth observation satellites monitoring Earth's ocean and remote locations every hour

Nanosatellites for Earth observation are very small, low cost satellites typically weighing kilograms and with volumes of a few liters.  NASA has a program called the CubeSat Launch initiative (CSLI) which provides opportunities for nanosatellites to fly inexpensively as auxiliary payloads on rockets supporting major missions.  NASA's CubeSats are cube-shaped satellites 10cm x 10cm x 10cm with a volume of about a liter and weighing about 1.3 kilograms.

Three startup satellite companies have already started putting nanosatellite constellations in space, that promise to provide much more frequent revisits per day than existing satellites can provide and at a much lower cost.

In April 2013 Planet Labs launched two demonstration satellites, “Dove 1” and “Dove 2”.  Planet Labs has already launched 72 cubesats and plans to launch a total 100 of the Earth observing satellites at an altitude of 400 km.  The satellites will provide frequent snapshots of the planet at a resolution of about 5 m, allowing users to track changes such as traffic jams, deforestation, construction progress in close to real time.

Skybox Imaging, acquired by Google, has launched the SkySat-1 and SkySat-2 satellites (each larger than nanosatellites at about 100 kg) which are intended to capture sub-meter imagery and HD-video of any spot on earth, multiple times per day to provide timely high-resolution imagery, HD video, and analytics.

Spire Global

In November 2013 two nanosatellites, NanoSatisfi's ArduSat 1 and ArduSat X, supported by Kickstarter crowdfunding were placed in orbit from the International Space Station .  NanoSatisfi has since been renamed.  Spire Global Inc, has launched 4 out of more than 50 planned remote sensing cubesats into orbit at altitudes of 500–600 km. Spire's remote sensing satellites range from cubesat 1U to 3U and are built with Commercial Off-The-Shelf (COTS) components wherever possible to lower costs. The spacecraft carry multiple sensors including RF sensors that are not restricted by clouds, haze and night.

Spire's business niche is 80 km from any coastline,  the three-quarters of the Earth that is either covered by water or considered remote and is not regularly monitored by today's remote-sensing satellites.  Spire plans to be able to collect data from any point on Earth every hour. 

Spire’s multi-sensor satellites provide a variety of data types such as Automatic Identification System (AIS) service for tracking ships, and weather payloads that measure temperature, pressure and precipitation. Spire plans for a 2 year refresh cycle on each satellite enabling a continual improvement in on-board technology .

Some of the applications Spire is targeting include;

• Illegal fishing - Monitoring illegal, under-reported and unregulated fishing.
• Trade monitoring - Virtually all global trade transits through areas of the planet otherwise ignored by traditional remote sensing. Spire can deliver reliable data on every ship in every ocean every hour.
• Marine domain awareness - Criminal activities such as illegal shipments and clandestine cargo exchange are some of the issues.

Other applications envisioned for the future include;

• Insurance - when ships collide determining what actually happened
• Environmental impact - in case of oil spills helping to determine who's liable
• Asset tracking - finding ships in distress faster
• Piracy - vessel tracking that cannot be disabled by pirates

Antares rocket failure slows Planet Labs' Earth observation cubesat deployment

28 Dove Cubesat satellites each weighing about 5 kilograms of Planet Labs' Flock 1 constellation began deploying in early February of this year from the ISS.  Planet Labs, San Francisco, California provides medium-resolution (3- to 5-meter) “whole Earth” imaging with high frequency revisits.  The constellation is designed to provide low spatial resolution and high temporal resolution.  According to Planet Labs the total constellation will be comprised of 100 Cubesat satellites. Up to 10 % of the satellites can fail without affecting the capability of the whole constellation.  To date Planet Labs has launched 71 Doves in 18 months on 6 launch vehicles. 

Last week the Antares rocket on a mission to the ISS failed. The rocket was carrying 26 Flock 1d satellites.  Because the individual Cubesat satellites are very inexpensive compared to a Worldview-3, for example, a launch failure is not catastrophic. Planet Labs' approach to further mitigate the risk of this type of failure is to deploy their fleets of satellites on multiple launch vehicles, from multiple vendors. Planet Labs also place more satellites in orbit than are required so that if satellites fail in orbit they can ensure constellation continuity.

First Worldview-3 images with 40 cm resolution available for download

Digital Globe’s WorldView-3 Earth observation satellite was launched August 13, the first commercial Atlas mission to fly out of Vandenberg.  WorldView-3 is the first multi-payload, super-spectral, one-foot-resolution commercial satellite. It is intended to operate at an altitude of 617 km and can collect up to 680,000 km² per day.  WorldView-3 is capable of

• 31 cm panchromatic resolution
• 1.24 m multispectral resolution (8 bands)
• 3.7 m short-wave infrared resolution (8 bands)
• 30 m Clouds, Aerosols, Vapors, Ice, and Snow (CAVIS) resolution (12 bands)

with an  average revisit time of less than 1 day. Digital Globe has received permission from the U.S. Department of Commerce to sell imagery to all of its customers at up to 25 cm panchromatic and 1.0 m multispectral ground sample distance (GSD) beginning six months after WorldView-3 is operational.

WorldView-3 is now sending images back to Earth.  Digital Globe has released some images of Madrid, but is only licensed to release images with 40 cm resolution at this time.

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Earth observation satellite Worldview-3 with one-foot resolution successfully launched

United Launch Alliance (ULA) conducted a Atlas V launch today at 11:30 am PDT, orbiting DigitalGlobe’s WorldView-3 Earth observation satellite. The launch was the first commercial Atlas mission to fly out of Vandenberg.

WorldView-3 is the first multi-payload, super-spectral, one-foot-resolution commercial satellite. It is intended to operate at an altitude of 617 km and can collect up to 680,000 km² per day. 

First commercial Earth observation satellite with 31 cm resolution to be launched Aug 13

Lockheed Martin Commercial Launch Services has set the launch date for DigitalGlobe’s WorldView-3 Earth observation satellite for Aug. 13, 2014. The spacecraft will launch on an Atlas 5 from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.

WorldView-3, is the first multi-payload, super-spectral, one-foot-resolution commercial satellite. It is intended to operate at an altitude of 617 km and can collect up to 680,000 km² per day.  WorldView-3 is capable of

• 31 cm panchromatic resolution
• 1.24 m multispectral resolution (8 bands)
• 3.7 m short-wave infrared resolution (8 bands)
• 30 m Clouds, Aerosols, Vapors, Ice, and Snow (CAVIS) resolution (12 bands)

with an  average revisit time of less than 1 day. 

Digital Globe has received permission from the U.S. Department of Commerce to sell imagery to all of its customers at up to 25 cm panchromatic and 1.0 m multispectral ground sample distance (GSD) beginning six months after WorldView-3 is operational.

The Atlas 5 launch is set for August 13, 2014 at 11:30 AM (PDT).  You can watch the launch here.

NASA’s first dedicated satellite to study atmospheric carbon dioxide launched

July 2, 2014 at 2:56 AM the Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2), NASA’s first dedicated Earth remote sensing satellite to study atmospheric carbon dioxide from Space. was launched on a Delta rocket. OCO-2 will be collecting space-based global measurements of atmospheric CO2 with the precision, resolution, and coverage needed to characterize sources and sinks on regional scales. OCO-2 will also be able to quantify CO2 variability over seasonal cycles.

The world’s oceans, plants and soils on land, and numerous other less significant carbon pools within the global carbon cycle steadily absorb carbon and are called sinks. They serve to reduce the amount of CO2 that remains in the atmosphere. However, the geographic distributions of carbon uptakes by the oceans and terrestrial ecosystems are still uncertain. In addition, the effectiveness and efficiency of these sinks may change over time as more CO2 is emitted into the atmosphere.
        
OCO-2 will be collecting high-resolution measurements, which will provide a greater spatial distribution of CO2 over the entire globe.  These measurements will be combined with data from the ground-based network to provide scientists with the information that they need to better understand the processes that regulate atmospheric CO2 and its role in the carbon cycle.